


Sleep In His Shadow

by AnOddSock



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Slavery, Blood, Body Horror, Claustrophobia, Cock Cages, Collars, Confinement, Force-Feeding, Human Castiel, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Sam Winchester, Intubation, Isolation, M/M, Medical Procedures, Medical Torture, Mutilation, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Non-Consensual Bondage, Non-Sexual Slavery, Sensory Deprivation, Sexual Slavery, enclosed spaces
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-25 18:44:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17126726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnOddSock/pseuds/AnOddSock
Summary: After they failed to stop the apocalypse, Sam and Dean's lives changed unrecognizably. Emerging from his ordeal in isolation, Dean finds the waking world is no less nightmarish.Kept apart from the world, and from each other, all they can do is try and stop the other from being hurt.It never works.





	Sleep In His Shadow

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes when I'm sad (and horny) I write something even sadder (and kinkier) than I am. That is what this is.  
> But if what you want is gratuitous torture porn and hurt boys wrenched apart from each other over and over, well, have I got good news for you! (Just in time for Christmas!)

Restless.

Restless and trapped.

Can’t move. Can’t see.

Nothing to fight, nothing to do.

Alone.

Always alone.

Straining.

Can’t move.

Can’t see.

Can’t think.

Can’t hear.

Nothing.

Everything. All there is.

Alone. Contained. Trapped.

No reprieve.

No end. (There will be an end.)

The machine pushes air into his lungs, the machine pulls the air back out. His chest rises and falls as oxygen is forced in… and out. In… out. In… out.

Not even allowed to breathe. Not even given that.

Can’t move.

Have to move. Have to fight. Have to hold on.

Nothing.

Floating.

Nothing is real.

Everything is real. Too real.

Can’t move.

Can’t see.

Can’t think.

No reprieve.

No one cares.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Swallow it all down. Relax. Don’t fight. There’s nothing to fight. There’s nothing to do.

Stay still.

Be good. Be strong. _So weak can’t move._

Don’t think. Don’t wait.

Stay. Here. Encased.

Gone. Lost.

Unravelled.

Drift.

Despair.

_Sleep._

 

* * *

 

_Can’t move._

Always his first thought, often the only thought. He wants to, _has_ to, but he can’t. Shouldn’t try.

Desperate.

He realises… it’s not movement, not yet… but something has changed.

He’s changed. Changing. Changes.

Thoughts are hard to come by, but not now, now they’re coming faster. Closer. Crowding. He’s still so very trapped and he panics, screaming. Screaming and thrashing.

Not thrashing. Can’t move.

Whatever drugs were in his system to make him docile and force a blanket of muted dullness across his mind are going away.

_No, please. Come back._

Without them it’ll be worse, he'll be worse, more aware. More aware of everything, so trapped. Still here.

Unless.

_No no no._

Sammy. Not Sammy.

If they’re waking him up… Sammy! Please no.

He moans again. Quieter. Probably. He’s all stuffed up; his ears, his mouth, his _body._ Maybe he’s not quiet at all. Maybe he never was. He doesn’t know, he can’t ever tell.

He can't tell what's real anymore, which things are his mind making nonsense of the nothing wrapped around him, and which things exist in real space.

The breathing apparatus isn’t connected anymore, his lungs expand on their own and it’s hard work. Like pushing the weight of a whole person off his chest with just the strength of his rib cage, his body struggling as the demands of oxygen force his lungs to work on their own for the first time in….

He doesn’t know.

He never knows.

Too long.

Not long enough. _Sammy._

Alone. Still alone. Not for long.

He must have moved already, the drawer slid slowly out, his limp, prone body extricated from the confines of the space and he didn’t even know it. Couldn’t even tell that his whole world was oriented sideways, he was that far gone.

But he knows he’s _out_ because the next thing he feels is the heavy suctioned weight of plastic being pried loose. Starting at his feet, it’s released, pulling up and sucking away from his body in a clinging way that sticks to his skin before it finally releases him.

He cries out again as it’s carefully eased off his entire body, all the way up to his neck and it _hurts._

His first sensation in… he doesn’t know how long.

He never knows.

The first thing he’s felt that hasn’t been muffled into the background by drugs and sleepy breathing and it _hurts._

He can never tell if it actually hurts or if it’s just the first swell of his nerves feeling sensation that makes it more intense. But it feels like it hurts, like a second skin peeling away.

Movement, blessed, sweet. His muscles twitch. Still strapped down, confined, held very, very still. But there’s air, and he can feel it and there’s space for his limbs to strain. To actually fight back.

So weak though. So very weak. Can’t move. Not really.

Just breathe. Air in, air out, it’s not so different. Not so much, really, than it was before. Just lie still. Don’t move. Don’t try to move. Can’t move.

He’s sluggish, consciousness twisting away from reality, awful painful reality. Doesn’t want to wake. Doesn’t want to know, or see, or feel.

Unable to see. Unable to touch. Denied.

But he’s not so far gone that he doesn’t feel the jolt, and drag, the catheter coming loose. Pried out of his cock. His limp, sad excuse for a manhood, probably shrivelled up, unused in the confines of its cage. It stings. He whimpers.

He sighs when it’s gone.

The other tube comes next, the worse one. The waste tube, the enema tube. Both things. Neither thing right now though, right now it’s just emptied out of him. He’s still strapped down, can’t move, can’t see, but he can tell they’re getting him out.

Relief.

Sweet relief.

Sullied by knowing what it means, for him and for Sam.

Sam’s turn, his turn, time to do his job. Time for Sam to rest. Not rest, there’s no rest there’s only small, dark, locked, and packed away and left alone. So alone. He doesn’t want this ever again, never does, but he doesn’t want it for Sam either.

He feels a jolt in his throat, the little expanse of the balloon that keeps his oxygen tube in place retracting and deflating. He groans, he hates it, he needs it gone. He doesn’t know what he is without it, without its help to keep him alive.

Something changes around his face, the mask is taken away, pulling the tube from down his throat with it. Out through the hole in the mouth guard, up from down his trachea and across his tongue. He chokes, gagging as it pulls free. Gurgling nonsense noises that he's prevented from hearing, he just feels.

He can feel! There's air, he's out. He could move!

Not yet. _Not yet._

The cloth over his eyes is lifted away and bright light assaults his eyelids. Still closed, still taped down, a muted red blaze that makes him cringe. So bright.

Too bright. He wants to go back to sleep away from the pain. Toward the muted existence of his isolation where it doesn't sting and only throbs. He wants to go back and back before this was ever his life.

Fuck this life.

Fuck it all.

But he can’t. He can’t move. He can’t leave Sammy. They set it up perfectly. He can’t leave Sam behind here and Sam won’t leave him behind either so they’re stuck in this loop, this tortuous hell.

Alone.

Together, but alone.

He moans, frustrated, and tries to moves again, tries to arch his back or something — anything.

A hand touches the middle of his chest and his breath sticks in his lungs. It presses reassuringly, telling him — he thinks — to stay still a little longer. It’s firm but not cruel and not meaty enough to be Azazel. Long nimble fingers and a soft palm. He calms. Just a little.

Just a tiny amount.

It must be Cas.

And really, who else would it be?

He wants to cry, he wants to crack a joke. He wants to see, or hear, or speak. The hand pats him once more and disappears.

He floats a little, trying to ignore the way he still can’t move — that after all this time it isn’t over — and tries to get lost in it so he doesn’t think about what’s to come. Tries not think about seeing, helpless as he’s hurt, watching him be put out of reach.

The fury that brings is never good. _Never_ good. It gets them both into trouble. He has to squash it down, but that just makes him desperate, distraught. It eats at him.

Helpless.

_Can't move can't get away._

Cas peels off the electrodes bit by bit, sticky little shapes that adhere to his skin. The little menaces that vibrate his muscles in rotations so that nothing weakens too far, so nothing atrophies.

What good is a weak slave, after all?

He doesn’t know how long it’s been since the last hit of healing magic entered his system, just a little thing, a little jolt to keep him healthy. A tiny magic drug that keeps him on the right side of alive no matter how long he’s left to rot. Nothings feels too sore, not too much pressure or weight where he’s pressed to the makeshift bed of his imprisonment, but he’s so sensitive to right now stimulus it’s hard to tell.

Cas begins to wipe him down, methodically, evenly, unstrapping one limb at a time. Dean grunts, tries to grimace, it hurts to move. The lukewarm water and cloth feel like sandpaper. He’s glad to be unrestrained though, until Cas refastens the straps. Dean can feel him tremble, his hands shaking, as he bundles him back into place all over again before moving to the next part of his body.

It’s worrisome, and the drugs have left his system enough that he can think. He can reason enough to notice that this isn’t good, that it's different. Worse than usual.

He just doesn’t know why yet.

Why can't he move?

He wonders if Azazel is there, watching. He’s furious, not knowing who can see him, who could touch him, who might be enjoying his suffering.

Is Sam there? Is he in the room right now?

The thought makes him try to speak, garbled nonsense because the rubber mouth guard is still between his teeth and the chin strap is keeping his mouth closed around it.

Cas touches his face and then quickly whips away.

The headphones get removed. The echoing silence that has deafened him lifts. Sound rushes in to fill the gaps in his head, muffled, muted but present.

He takes a deep breath, trying not to panic.

It’s so much, it’s all consuming. All of this, all the revelations of being awake and _out._ And he’s so tired. Exhaustion wrapping around his entire being and holding him still even more than the ties that bind him.

People move around him, he can tell it’s more than one. Voices. Footsteps. A laugh.

Fingers pry into his ears and force the earplugs one after the other and the world crashes into focus. Sharp and loud.

“Hey Dean my old boy, you awake in there?” Azazel laughs, squeezing his face.

Dean grunts an affirmative.

“Not very polite are we? Don’t go getting your panties in a twist, we just need to have a little chat.”

Dean can’t even roll his head, can’t nod, can’t blink. _Can’t move_. The inner mantra that’s been his life makes him quake. He feels small and he refuses to feel small.

He his small, in the face of this, he is. He can’t beat them, can’t win. But he refuses to feel it. The walls come up again, broken down by the long stretch of isolation he builds them back up. Or starts to, anyway. It will take some time. He can’t blame himself for being vulnerable, locked in place, looked over with a critical eye, treated like a pack of meat.

“Sam’s here,” Azazel says.

It’s a taunt. It works.

He growls, but it sounds more like a groan.

“Yeah, he’s all ready to take his turn. But I thought you might want to see him before that. And we have a few new developments that I think are going to affect you in ways you can’t even imagine.”

“Sir, should I?” Cas asks. Low, humble, soft.

Dean aches. Cas shouldn’t have to do this.

“Go right ahead.”

Careful fingertips find the tape flattened against his skin and begin to lift it off. One strip, two, his right eye free. He blinks it open and shudders under the onslaught of imagery.

He closes it while the other side is done, and then slowly pries them open crack by crack to see Cas’s worried face.

“Keep going,” says Azazel’s impatient voice and Cas leaves.

His head won’t budge, he’s stuck staring at the clinical ceiling over his head as he twitches in the restraints.

Azazel’s face appears above him, leering. “Well, you look like shit.”

“ _Just sit down, gently.”_

Cas, talking to _Sam._

No no no no. He groans and twists, panting useless, unhelpful breaths.

“You want to calm the fuck down boy before you get someone hurt,” Azazel says and it’s all smile, all teeth and daring eyes. He likes to hurt, he’d love the chance to do it more.

Dean stills.

“Good, well, if everybody is present,” he snaps open the straps holding Dean’s head in place and Dean rolls it left, towards Sam.

The mouth guard prevents him from speaking but he sees him, sat right there, long legs and worried eyes.

He gets a nod of acknowledgement and tries to smile back. The rubber between his teeth is such an annoyance and he tries to spit it out now that he can but Azazel slaps a ruthless hand over his mouth.

“Oh no, see that’s what I want to talk about. Sam here had a little mishap this morning and it’s going to reflect badly on you.”

He swallows, eyes raking over Sam’s form for a sign of distress or hurt, watching for laboured movement or pain. Sam shakes his head, sorry, looking so very sorry.

“Wanna know what he did Dean?”

Dean looks up into the eyes of the man that calls himself their master and frowns.

“Well, I’m going to tell you anyway, come on it’ll be fun, we’ve never done this before.”

Dean’s stomach drops to a new low. Out of the peripheral of his vision he sees Sam shakily lay out on the opposite table drawer, the black vinyl cushion squashing under his weight as his legs and arms settle in straight.

Azazel turns away then with a stern tap of his finger on the rubber in Dean’s mouth; a warning, don’t spit it out.

He walks over to Sam and gives him a playful slap on the cheek. Sam is rigid, fear and determination written in every taut line of his body. Azazel works the first strap closed over Sam’s chest and pulls it tight. Sam clenches his jaw.

“We were having such a nice morning, making good use of Sam’s beautiful form, making sure everyone knew their place for the day. I’d even been particularly nice, not given him anything worse to deal with,” Azazel speaks slowly, working his way around Sam and forcing every part of his body correctly into position and binding him down. Two straps for each thigh, ankles, knees, shoulders, chest, stomach and hips, upper arms, and lower, wrists. So many.

Can’t move. No give. Strong and tight. Piece by piece.

The metal rails on the side of the large drawer are just within Sam’s reach and his right hand is gripped around it, knuckles white. It’s awful, he knows what’s coming, he knows where he’s going and he can’t do anything to stop it. If he fights or protests or tries to get away the punishment will come out of Dean’s hide.

It’s how they keep them so neatly in line, controlled and ordered about and they do their best to obey. Neither wants to see the other hurt for their mistakes or for little defiances that don’t mean anything in the grand scheme of things.

“And then this little shit,” Azazel continues, a hand somewhere between Sam’s legs that Dean can’t see but that makes Sam squeeze his eyes shut in pain. “This little fuck-up got his teeth all over my cock.”

Sam gasps as Azazel releases whatever part of Sam he was hurting. Dean breathes sharp and fast through his nose.

“And I thought to myself, I thought how can I properly make a lesson out of this? I mean sure, the usual methods work pretty well and I could just add some lashes onto the count your little bro here racked up for you, but I thought maybe we should try something a little different.”

He steps away from Sam and Cas moves back into sight, his eyes flicking nervously to Dean. He busies himself preparing Sam and Dean can’t see because _Master_ steps in front of his face blocking his line of sight but Sam moans little high pitched sounds and Dean _knows._

Catheter, anal tube, electrodes. It doesn’t really matter which one it is at this precise moment, they’re all coming.

He shakes his head rather than let himself tremble.

“So, you know what I’m going to do?” Azazel is enjoying this, grinning and showing off, making a grand display of it. “I’m going to take away your mouth.”

Dean balks. He doesn’t understand but it doesn’t matter because it’s never going to be good. There’s nowhere the go, only his head is free and he’s barely been lucid for half an hour, his body wouldn't cooperate anyway.

Azazel wrenches his lips apart, yanking out the rubber protection that stops Dean from grinding his teeth and holds it up to the light before tossing it aside.

“Gags are all well and good but something a little more permanent might help you both remember your manners.”

He steps back and Sam is white as a sheet, staring at Dean with eyes brimming with tears.

Dean rolls his head away and _strains_. He can’t see his brother hurt like this, not on his account, he cries out but doesn’t dare actually speak.

“Tell him Sammy, tell big brother what you’ve done to him.”

Dean can’t breathe, he doesn’t want to know; all of a sudden he doesn’t want Sam to have to say it or hear the words exist. Whatever it is let it stay unknown.

_“Please.”_ He tries to speak but his mouth is so dry his tongue barely moves, it’s just a croak.

“What’s that?” Azazel mockingly leans close and then laughs. “Listen up now, here comes the big reveal.”

He stands aside so Dean can turn and see Sam again.

“He’s, your… sorry Dean, so sorry,” Sam gulps and his face crumples. “Going to… he’s going to - to sew your mouth closed.”

The words don’t register at first, don’t mean anything, and then they do and Dean is crying. He doesn’t mean to, really he doesn’t, but his chest heaves. It’s going to hurt. Over and over it’s going to hurt, every time he wants to speak, every time Azazel makes him need to yell in pain it’s going to hurt.

“I think that might give Sam plenty to think about while he’s stashed away and make sure he never does it again, right?”

Sam nods, “I won’t, I didn’t mean to, I can be more careful—”

Azazel stops him with a hand. “So dramatic. Well, doctor,” he turns to Cas, “no time like the present.”

It’s happening now? _It’s happening now._

_While Sam watches._

“I’m going to refasten these,” Cas says, standing close. “So you don’t jerk and tear anything.”

Dean nods, blank, empty. The straps, his head kept still, Cas’s careful hands and sweet face. There’s nothing to do but bear it.

What he doesn’t expect is a splash of water to enter his mouth, a few small trickles that wet his cheeks and his tongue.

“You’ll be kept hydrated and fed don’t worry, we'll leave your feeding tube in,” Cas frowns, must know his words are inadequate. “But keeping your mouth from drying out is important too. We’ll… we’ll find a straw… or something.” He’s practically whispering by the end, voice pitched so low in distress that he can barely speak.

Dean flicks his eyes sideways to Sam and finds Azazel leaning over, whispering lecherously into his ear. Sam won’t take his eyes off Dean and he’s mouthing apologies over and over.

“S’okay.” Dean mumbles.

Azazel digs fingers into Sam’s peck over the scarred skin that used to be the anti-possession tattoo, scratching into the tender flesh until Sam screeches. “No one told you to talk did they?”

Dean shuts his mouth.

“That’s got to be a record, making a count for next time I punish Sam before you’re even off the table. My god, do you just never learn?” But he looks happy as he says it, gleeful in knowing how much he can torment them.

Cas is at his other side and there’s something shiny in his hand. Dean closes his eyes and tries to disappear.

It takes a long time, and also no time at all. Dean slips in and out of the state he was in before they unpacked him. The drugs are still there in his veins, deep down, and he chases the release they can give. He finds it, and loses it.

The needle pierces his skin and he’s feels every atom pricked on its point, and then thread pulls through and his mind leaps away chasing oblivion.

Over and over. Pinching his lips together, drawing them closed. Blood dribbles in rivulets onto his tongue and he swallows it, metallic, sweet and wrong. The first thing he’s tasted in… however long he’s been in storage.

Holes on holes, two neat rows, the chin strap holding him in place so Cas’s hands can torture him on Azazel’s orders.

“Looks good doc, doing a stellar job. Of course this just means you’ll have to try twice as hard to please me Deanie, you’ll be one hole down. I’m not sure how we’ll make up for that.”

Dean’s eyes fly open, he hadn’t even thought… hadn’t considered…

“I’m sure we’ll think of something, but hey, if your backside ends up a little raw you can just blame Sam, can’t you?”

“Dean….”

Dean can’t see him, he can't turn his head and his eyes have lost focus. He tries to nod, to blow off Sam's apology. It’s really not Sam’s fault.

“How long do you think you’ve been under for? Got any clue?”

Cas is finishing now, wiping away the blood, trying to patch him back together.

Sam draws a squeal of breath, pain clearly laced through every millisecond of it, and Dean panics. Azazel must have his hands or his teeth somewhere they’re not supposed to be. None of this is _supposed_ to be. They were hunters once, a long time ago…. before.

Before the world fell. Before Lucifer rose. Before before before.

And then.

Then this.

The prey, they were hunted, they were caught.

Azazel made an example of them. The men meant to save the world under his thumb, at the end of his fury.

Demons took over the earth, Dean never knew how much or how badly. He and Sam were done for by then anyway, broken in under Hell’s orders and given to Azazel for safe keeping.

“Tell him Sam, how much time is he missing?”

The question brings him back to the present with a bump. A bump and a choked moan when he grimaces and his stitches pull and it hurts just as much as he feared.

“Six weeks.”

It’s whispered. Dirty. Dean is halfway lost in pain, anger, and memories. But he knows six weeks is a long time.

_Six weeks?_

Six weeks where Sam was defenceless and alone.

Six weeks he was in that drawer. A whole month and half of another where he knew nothing but darkness. Still, alone, _can’t move_. He struggles against everything restraining him, little desperate noises echoing out from his chest. Anger. Terror. Hate. Need. It's all mixed up together in a cocktail of desperation.

And now it's Sam’s turn.

Cas unstraps him point by point, and it takes a minute to free him, before he can be turned onto his side. He flops against the metal with useless limbs. He feels tears leaking into his hair and blinks them away. He just wants to look now, a good look at Sam.

He’s too thin, Dean notes. Ribs showing and knees all knobbly, like he was as a teenager. Dean is probably too thin too but he never has much chance to look at himself, he doesn’t care to see what the world has made of him and if Azazel chooses to fuck him in front of a mirror, well, there are more pressing issues to deal with then.

Sam is barely containing his anxiety, jerking at his bonds, pulling at his straps.

Azazel teases him — biting a nipple, running something sharp up the inside of his thigh. A hand twisting between Sam's legs up near his groin and pulling up an expanse of purple, tortured flesh. Sam's eyes are wide open and his mouth gasping in little hitches as his balls are mercilessly stretched and squeezed.

“You think real hard about how much you want to please me. You remember how your brother looks with stitches in his face.”

Sam turns to look and wavers, his fingers reach out as though he could touch. Dean stretches out too and they're far from meeting in the middle but it's symbolic, they're here, neither one of them alone. Dean would be beside him in a heartbeat if he could make his body move.

He buries his own pain away, locks it up tight where Sam won't have to see it and tries to show Sam that's he's here, _he's here_. Don't be afraid.

It won't harm him, not really. It certainly won't kill him, everything is too closely monitored for that. But it will be torture, it will be painful, he will be alone and Dean can do nothing.

Nothing but give Sam these last few moments together.

“You got any last words Sammy?”

Dean grunts, he's furious and overwrought and hurting but Sam is about to be smothered with tubes and plastic and he can't even speak to Sam before it happens. He can't even lend comfort. He can't get up and gank the monster who's threatening them and he can't stop it but that man is not allowed to call him Sammy. Not like this, not _ever_ if Dean had any say.

“Aww is that Dean trying to say something? Listen to that Sam,” he grabs Sam face and makes sure he's looking at Dean. “Look at how much worse you've made things for him.”

Dean desperately shakes his head, lips straining even though it's agony, just to make Sam understand _it's not your fault._

“Sorry. Fuck, no, you it’s _you._ ” Sam says, fighting back against Azazel’s hand, trying to wrench his head free.

“Me, always me,” Azazel's fingers dig into the soft flesh of Sam's cheeks, squeezing until there are angry marks left behind. “That's all you get now, Lucifer's precious protege and there's nothing left for you in the world but me, and my will, and however much you want to hurt each other.”

“I don't,” Sam whispers. “Never want to hurt you.” He looks into Dean's eyes and Dean can see he’s breaking apart.

“Well you've got a funny way of showing it. I thought you were supposed to be clever or something,” Azazel says, drawling, bored.

Sam was so young when all this started, barely had time to be a man and he was holding back the apocalypse with his bare hands and veins full of demon blood.

Dean slumps on his table and blinks tiredly, tries to look convincingly aware of how fucked up it all is and how _it's not your fault._

“Come on doc, let's finish him up.”

Cas wraps Sam's fingers carefully together with bandages, and curls them into a fist with his thumb pressed down too. Dean looks down bleakly at his own hands and how they haven't been undone yet, he can't pick at them with his teeth either. He's still stuck until someone helps him.

Cas brings out the feeding tube and Dean watches as he prepares Sam. Trying to get him to relax.

The mouth guard goes in first, dark blue in a world of metal and grey equipment. Sam clamps down and Dean steels himself for watching the tube being forced down Sam's throat.

As Cas begins to feed the tube up Sam's nose Deans ankles are pried apart and he inhales noisily and whines in surprise. Sam clenches and cries out, trying to lift his head to see.

It's only Azazel, elbowing Dean's legs apart and pushing into his hole with one slick finger. Dean moans at the cold and the intrusion and Cas is telling Sam to relax and Azazel is rubbing lube inside of his hole all at once.

“And swallow Sam, and again,” Cas says, gently easing the tubing further in while Sam tries to help it down, all the way down to his stomach where he can be fed without ever tasting it.

“So tight in here, haven't seen any action in so long. Don't worry we'll fix that.” Azazel tells Dean and he looks down and scowls, attempting to squirm away. “Feels good doesn't it? Being put to use again?”

Dean doesn't think so. But he's not sure. He's being touched and Sam is being medically tortured and he doesn't know which one, honestly, is worse. Which one would he chose for himself, or for Sam?

Once the tube is down Sam's throat he turns to look at Dean one last time before his head is fastened into place.

Azazel finishes applying a generous helping of lube and begins twisting a butt plug into his hole instead. Screwing it, pushing it, not giving up until it's sinking inside him.

Cas stands at the far side of the room ready to intubate Sam. Oxygen tube and mask in hand. Sam looks to be hyperventilating and Dean can’t even care that Azazel is rotating the plug inside him and then fucking him on a piece of plastic because he’s right here and he’s helpless.

He tries to pull away, to crawl off the table and make it to Sam but a hand clamps down on his hip and a soft voice tells him _just watch._

And then Cas looks at him, jaw clenched and frowning, and nods. Dean knows it’s not something Cas can help — he’s as trapped as the rest of them — but he screams anyway as the mask covers Sam’s face. Cas feeds the tube into Sam’s mouth inch by inch and Dean watches his throat work to contain the apparatus that will control his life for the foreseeable future.

Dean’s lips tug harshly, bringing new drips of blood into his tongue, the stitches trying to stretch with the way emotion his pouring out of his body in every breathy exhale. And he knows he’s not helping, knows he’s not comforting Sam really, but maybe. Maybe if Sam can hear his voice even though it’s not words, even though he can’t speak?

Azazel laughs and it takes every piece of resolve Dean has not to kick him in the face.

 

Azazel sticks the tape over Sam’s eyes himself, so he’s last thing Sam sees. Dean’s tears have dried up and he’s more exhausted than ever.

“Just so you know Sam,” Azazel says conversationally, “That collar you picked out earlier is going round Dean’s neck in a minute, he’s going to wear it every single second. I hope you still feel good about your choice.”

Sam convulses. He’s still drawing air into his lungs himself, the tubes aren't connected yet, and Dean can see how he’s fighting all of it. Every muscle flexed and straining.

“And those ninety-three mistakes you made, I’ll be creative, make sure Dean really feels every single one of the times you misbehaved.”

Ninety-three seems like a lot, lashes, beatings, whatever it will be. Dean wonders what Sam did to earn them, what situations he was put in where he couldn’t comply quickly enough. It’s not a good thought.

There are very few good thoughts.

“Have a nice few weeks thinking about that.”

They lay the blindfold on, and pull out the PVC sheet and Dean is shivering now. Still naked, still weak and going through some sort of withdrawal, and he makes a small sound of protest that goes entirely ignored.

“Is this… is it really necessary?” Cas asks. He always asks. The answer is always the same.

“Are you questioning my orders?”

“No, sir.”

“Really? It did sound like you were.”

“Just checking… you—”

“Just do it.” Azazel says, spreading his hands and walking away.

Cas lays it across Sam’s body, fastens it down to the thin cushion Sam is laid on and smooths everything out.

The sucking sticking sound of every piece of air being removed from between Sam and the sheet sounds like death, sounds like mourning. He struggles weakly as he’s compressed and held down by the laws of physics as the vacuum seal is completed and every inch of him from his toes to his neck is immobilised.

Dean whimpers. Sam shudders, until at last, he is utterly still apart from the laboured rise and fall of his chest and small spasms that do nothing but show how tightly he’s stuck in place.

Azazel gets Dean up then, dragging him to shaky legs, and hurls him to Sam’s side where he leans weakly on the table for support.

“Say your goodbyes.”

Cruel joke, cruel life.

Dean paws at Sam’s face, leaning down to press his forehead to the sliver of available skin above the blindfold.

He presses their heads together while Cas bolts the rigid metal bands to the table. Over Sam's shoulders, hip bones and wrists, his upper legs, and across his ankles. Immovable forms molded to his body shape, pinning him where he's already held down. Pointless. Just extra rigidity to make it feel worse.

Just torture.

Sam moans and Dean feels the way he trembles.

“Last piece now Sam.” Cas’s voice is broken, grating and he holds the earplugs between pale white fingers. Dean doesn’t dare look at him in case it shatters them both. Cas has cared for them all the long years of their imprisonment, slaving away at Azazel’s orders under threat of death or worse.

This new development since their last botched escape plan, this new punishment where they are not allowed to see each other, never allowed to be out in the world at the same time, has worn him thinner than all the rest of it. Almost two years of this — being in charge of their health, their wellbeing, while forcing them time after time into isolation and confinement — and Cas is half the weight and half the man he was before.

Sam groans meekly. And then he’s gone, lost in silence as the earplugs and the headphones take him away from Dean all over again.

 

Dean is a crumpled mess on the floor by the time Cas is done with the machines and the checks, Sam is halfway slid into the drawer while each piece of equipment is attached and set up to work. Set up to regulate his food, water, waste, and whatever passes as muscle stimulation in this thing. Cas leaves the oxygen apparatus until the last moment but it has to happen and Dean closes his eyes when Sam’s chest begins to rise and fall in an automated fashion.

He knows exactly what it’s like to be in there, to be lonely and deprived, nothing left but blackness and fear. 

He curls into a ball and hopes he might get a moment alone with Cas before all this is done. It’s a small silly thing to hope for in the face of everything but if he can’t keep hoping he can’t keep living.

Azazel returns though, before Cas is through. He has a thick metal collar in hand, rolled steel and cold to the touch. He crouches beside Dean and hauls his head up by his hair.

“Ready to go for a ride?”

Dean just closes his eyes.

The drawer slams shut.

The lock clicks into place.

“Don’t worry, I have a party in two weeks where you’ll both be required to be in attendance, so he won’t be away for long.”

He gulps, hating that he knows that piece of information.

His throat gets wrapped with heavy steel. Steel that Sam chose for him. Should it feel good? What other options were there that this unyielding weight was the best choice?

Azazel pulls him to his feet and leashes him to the handle on the drawer where Sam is _kept_. Where Sam is _punished_.

“Not sure which of you I’ll put away after that, maybe I’ll make you compete for it, see who can be the most entertaining.”

His hips are pulled backwards and his feet urged apart. His shoulders sag under the weight of the collar around his neck.

“That would be fun wouldn’t it? See who can win their freedom for another week, or another month.”

His own distorted image blinks back at him, a reflection in brushed steel of a haggard man with bloody lips and half closed eyes.

His arms come up to rest on the metal drawer front to steady his body, he pillows his head on them and shakes.

Azazel removes his butt plug.

Cas is clearing away the remains of Dean’s imprisonment.

Azazel fiddles with some controls on a panel and bites at the back of his shoulder until the skin breaks and tiny beads of blood get smeared across his skin. Warm. Sticky.

“I just turned the microphone on big boy, Sam’s headphones are playing this right now. A little muffled probably by those pesky little earplugs but I’m sure he’ll get the gist.”

The wide head of a cock nudges at his entrance and he gasps around a cry for help, swallowing it down.

The cock pushes in and Dean slumps, the arm around his waist a good portion of the reason he’s still upright.

“Gonna have to do better than that pet, if you want Sam to hear you. And you want Sam to hear you, because _I_ want Sam to hear you, understand?”

Azazel fucks him rough and fast, and Dean lowers the barriers and defences that could let him withstand pain with dignity, and lets every noise flow out through his mutilated lips.

When they’re done and Azazel thrusts the leash into Cas’s waiting hand, Dean wonders what was so bad about being locked away. Why was it so terrible? Being out here, surely, is worse?

Leaving your brother behind in a box, stuffed in a chamber hardly bigger than a morgue drawer while you walk free is worse. Isn’t it? Sam’s in there, possibly screaming, definitely suffering and Dean just got fucked so loudly there was no way he didn’t hear it.

“Get him to Meg and get him properly cleaned up. See if she can do something to make that tube look less unsightly, and if she can’t — find a hood he can wear so I don’t have to see it.”

Cas nods, but Azazel is gone before he waits to see if the order is carried out.

It’s a long, slow walk through the oversized mansion to Meg’s suite and Cas has to carry half Dean’s weight to get them there.

“Well, sweetheart, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” she says on their arrival.

Dean doesn’t know if she means him or Cas. Cas hands Dean over and hurries off in the opposite direction.

“He’ll be back, don’t worry.”

Dean knows. He’ll be going to throw up, to cry and scream and then throw up a second time over what he was just made to do.

He’s too tired to worry. It’s not like it’ll fix anything and Cas will gather the pieces of himself back together soon enough.

Meg sits him down gingerly on the edge of a large sunken tub.

She clicks her tongue and hums her way through checking Dean out and cleaning up his face, clearing away the blood. She unwraps his hands and massage cramps out of his muscles before she lets him sink into the water with firm instructions not to get the stitches wet.

She wanders away and comes back and sinks in beside him, sweet smelling soaps and oils in hand. She gently washes his hair from behind and massages his scalp. It feels good. It feels terrible. It feels like enjoying the sun while someone is buried underground.

“They really did a number on you didn’t they.”

Dean whips around to look at her, indignant, she knows Cas would never be party to this if he had a choice.

“I didn’t mean him, idiot.”

Dean can’t even apologise. Can’t speak. Of course she doesn’t blame Cas. It’s their fault, the demons, the abominations. She’s one too, but… they like her well enough, and she’s not exactly here by her own volition either.

“Well, we all have our crosses to bear. Best make you look the part though hadn’t we.”

There’ll be clothes for him eventually, once he can bear the weight of something pressing on his skin, just another thing Azazel can rip away from him when the times comes. But for now he tries to relax into Meg’s touch, and rest while he can.

As he’s being buffed and dried, his skin gently cared for, Cas returns with a notebook concealed inside his freshly clean shirt.

Dean lights up.

“He didn’t have chance to write much this time, Azazel kept him busy, but he was okay Dean. He wasn’t hurt too badly, everything went… it wasn’t the worst. He was careful, he didn’t get into too much trouble.”

Dean looks up, wanting more detail, until he flips open the book and sees that Sam’s idea of “ _not much_ ” is nearly two dozen pages of tiny scrawled writing. He almost smiles and then winces when it tugs his lips.

There’ll be plenty of detail here, plenty of Sam to get by on. Something that aches around Dean’s chest eases a little as he begins to read.

_Remembered some more lyrics to that song you couldn’t remember, put them in the back of the book with the others. I ate well today, A has guests coming and he wants me to have good stamina. I’d have better stamina if I could go running but settled for helping Garth lug his stuff around, he came by for a few days and A didn’t need me much. G seemed sad to miss you, I don’t take it personally, even though we all know I’m better company._

And so it went on, Sam's life on a page. It's hard to take, to see it reduced to this and nothing else. But Dean will grab at it, hold it, fight for it.

There's a reason they're not dead yet. There are reasons they hold on.

_Don't move_ his mind whispers.

_Don't leave._

_Stay._

_Fight._

**Author's Note:**

> Before anyone asks I'm not intending to write more in this verse, it's just a one shot that I had to get out there.  
> Feel free to headcanon any kind of continuation you like.  
> Leave me a comment if you liked it, revel in the whump with me!


End file.
